


When We Belonged to the Sea

by RedFive



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: 2016 HBB, Abigail gets revenge, Animal Death, Hannibal Big Bang, Hannibal is a merman, Hannibal is still a cannibal, Kissing, M/M, Penguins, Reincarnation, Sirens, Suicidal Thoughts, Will Graham Loves His Dogs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-25
Updated: 2016-10-05
Packaged: 2018-08-16 17:15:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 13
Words: 16,313
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8110777
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RedFive/pseuds/RedFive
Summary: An AU in which Will and Hannibal do not survive the Fall and Hannibal is reincarnated as a siren. It's a solitary life, until a survivor from one of Hannibal's shipwrecks washes up on shore. Ordinarily, he would just kill and eat the human, but something is different about this one. Something is achingly familiar. Can the reincarnations of Will and Hannibal pick up where they left off and can Will finally accept that he's in love with a monster?





	1. The Destruction is Complete

**Author's Note:**

> What do you get when you let the NYC Fannibals decide your Big Bang story with a drunken 2AM tarot reading? A much more serious than it sounds reincarnation fic where Hannibal is a cannibal mermaid! 
> 
> This fic is FINISHED at 13 chapters, but later chapters still require various degrees of editing. I'll be uploading in chunks of at least three every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday so you won't have to wait long. 
> 
> Please enjoy the gorgeous art by the amazingly talented [monobani](http://monobani.tumblr.com). I just love it!<3

The last thing he remembered was Will's hand on his back applying pressure to his gunshot wound even as they went over the side of the cliff, or more accurately, as Will **pushed** them both over the cliff. 

There was a moment of pain and then...nothing.

When he came to, he stood at the back of the cathedral of San Palermo, a place he had once held is such high regard for its beauty. Now it was his coffin.

Hannibal was not alone in this beautiful prison. He saw Will as a specter in his periphery, but every time he turned towards his beloved or called out to him, the transparent shade vanished into the stale air. He let it happen a couple dozen times because there was nothing else to do. His hell appeared to be a one room cell. All the doors and windows were locked, and there was no escape into the crypts below.  "Is this to be my punishment, Will—chasing you for all eternity?" he asked the empty pews, but there is no answer.

The Serengeti, the marble caves of Chile, the aurora borealis, and **_this_ ** was all God had in store for him? Disgusting. Juvenile in design and lacking in artistry, Hell was turning out to be life's greatest disappointment.

Hannibal spotted another specter, but this one, a woman, did not disappear. Wearing a luminescent white robe, she knelt at the altar at the front of church. She had no wings, yet Hannibal assumed she was an angel since the biblical seraphim were depicted as flightless in the earliest Christian texts.

The blue-green plaid suit he wore fit him perfectly, but Hannibal adjusted his collar and waistcoat anyway to be sure it fell right. When he was satisfied with the presentation, he walked towards her, and pondered how he should address such a creature.  But these thoughts were interrupted when she stood up and turned to greet him.

Wind-chaffed skin. Brown hair. Plain but pretty. "Abigail," he said and something like remorse fluttered inside his chest.

Abigail’s eyes were blue as the sea that had swallowed his physical body, but very little else was familiar about them. She had changed since her death and grown more...well, more. There was a quiet sense of power in those blue pools, and did not doubt those waters wished to consume his soul as well.  

"Hello, Doctor Lecter," she said.

Will’s shade appeared behind her wearing his prison jumper. Menace and hatred obscured the soft features of his face. It was an unwelcomed sight to be sure. Hannibal had hoped never to see that expression again.

"Are you to be my jailor, Abigail?" he said ignoring Will, which caused Will’s image to vanish—if it was ever him at all. Abigail's presence here changed _everything._ Nothing could be trusted if she was behind these illusions. Divine punishment was far more predictable than a human scorned. 

"Judge, jury, and executioner," she said.

That was good. He could work with his situation. Perhaps Abigail could be made to either free him or condemn him quickly. It didn’t matter which as long as he escaped this purgatory and soon. Will was still out there...somewhere.

Hannibal smiled at her and only partially meant to be insulting. "What a pleasure."

Abigail's face was still, but Hannibal saw the ocean rise in her eyes. The waves crested and broke with an inspiring violence.

_‘You killed me. You_ **_KILLED_ ** _me, Hannibal. How dare you!?' they roared._

There was a sudden, searing pain as a phantom blade opened a bloodless wound across his abdomen. Hannibal struggled to remain on his feet; however, despite his best efforts, Abigail’s attack brought him to the ground.

He lay on all fours at her feet like an animal while panting to control the pain. Her gaze felt nearly as unpleasant as the imaginary knife still buried in his gut. Hannibal struggled to glare back at her. This may be Will’s memory, but it was her will that he should suffer this way. “Is this how you imagine Will felt,” he rasped, “or is this how you killed those girls alongside your father, Abigail?”

Hannibal stopped talking and lowered his eyes when he felt the tip of a knife at his throat.  He knew whose memory was coming next.

The pain disappeared then and only the echo of a powerful fear remained. It smelled like wet earth and honey, and Hannibal knew instinctively that despite his bravodo the fear belonged to him. ' _So death can still be interesting after all.'_ That was good. A moment ago he was at a loss for how to endure the monotony.

Abigail held a hand out to Hannibal. Her lips trembled in a familiar expression of worry and concern. Hannibal doubted, however, that it was his well being she was concerned about.  

"Don't make me do that again, Hannibal. I don't want to burn with you if that's what you're thinking. You'll go to hell alone if I decide you should."

Hannibal pushed his hair back before accepting her help.

He studied Abigail and calculated his next move. She looked well considering that she was dead. Even the scar on her neck had been completely healed. He brushed her hair from her face and tucked it behind the ear, which he had cut off in life. It was slightly galling to see his physical work undone so easily. However, God could not heal everything, he observed as he looked again into her eyes, which were filled with anger and a longing for Hannibal’s love and destruction.  Gone was the little girl he had once hoped would become family. She was powerful and lethal in death. "You are so beautiful, Abigail. I can only imagine how proud your father would be to see you now."

"Which one? I have three."

"Will. He loved you best out of all of us."

"Clearly," Abigail said with a glare. "He was the only one who didn’t slit my throat. Did you love me? Was any of it real? Don’t lie to me, Hannibal"

The nice thing about being dead was that there was no need to lie and deceive anymore. "My motivations and actions were primarily for my own self-interest,” he admitted, “but I did love you, Abigail. It was my sincerest wish to make a place for us all."

"What happened?"

"It is simply really I loved _him_ more."

Abigail's expression softened unexpectedly. "Thank you for your honesty," she said.

"Certainly, my dear," Hannibal put his hands in his pockets and cast his eyes around the cathedral. “Speaking of Will, what has become of him?" he asked now that Abigail had come around and warmed to him.

She stiffened and backed from him.  Hannibal realized he had been too eager and blown his opportunity. Now, she stood well out of reach both figuratively and literally.

"Gone to his own judgement, " she scolded. "You have no claim on him anymore, Hannibal. Will is free finally even if he is doomed."

Hannibal frowned in annoyance. Claim or no claim, if Will was in Hell then Hannibal was going to find him. "So what now, Abigail?"

"Well sending you to Hell would be too easy," she said as she slowly began to circle him like a cat, “and I have something better planned."

A change came over Abigail. She carried herself with a deadly grace that was equal to his own. She looked stately as she glided across the mosaic tile and disappeared from his line of sight. It was terrifying to witness. Here was Hannibal’s true legacy. Such a pity he had not seen it sooner.

"He may have been your father, but you were always _my daughter_ , Abigail,” Hannibal teased.

"You're not wrong. We're the same, you and I. That’s why they’re testing us to together. They’re waiting to see what I'll do with you and how you’ll respond," she said from somewhere behind him.

"They?"

"Oh, **_they_ ** are exactly who you think **_they_ ** are: those higher powers that go by so many names—the ones you disdain so much because their existence is constricting to you.”

"What will you do with me now, Abigail? I am tired of waiting." he said conscious how little power he wielded at the moment.  He needed to remain in control of the conversation.

She was suddenly at his shoulder, but he did not turn to look at her.

"Like you never played with your food," she whispered mockingly and rose onto her toes to leave the Judas kiss on his cheek.

He smiled to receive it. Hannibal ought to be frightened of what this great and terrible beauty had in store for him, but the only emotion he could muster was awe. If there were crimes he should indeed pay for, he trusted this creature to punish him exquisitely and disproportionately so. Here an end he could agree to. If he was to suffer, let him suffer at the hands of a god of his own making. It was probably for the best that Will had gone on ahead to his eternal punishment. It would kill him all over again to see Abigail like this.

"I'm ready," he said.

Abigail laughed, but it was a child's laugh once again, high-pitched and tinny. She twirled away and scampered up the steps of the altar. When she looked down at him again, her smile was radiant. "No, you're not."

The world lurked forward with a sickening twist and began to thin. His vision bent. His mind felt cold and murky. It took a moment to realize what was happening: he was being ripped away from the mooring that was Hannibal Lecter. He tried to fight it, but Hannibal was powerless to stop the walls of his memory palace from crumbling. “What have you done,  Abigail!?”

"You're going back, and I’m taking away your ability to hide. The outside will finally match what’s inside of you, Hannibal. This is your second chance. Don't let me down, Dad," Abigail said before the roof of the cathedral collapsed and buried them both.


	2. Hunger

He napped on the beach because there was little else to do today (or any day for that matter.)

In hindsight it may have been a mistake to eat the others, but such was life. Once he killed one of them, the only way to save himself had been to kill them all. Family was funny like that. They liked to stick to together. He had no regrets about it. He had never connected to the concept of family, and truly, they had only themselves to blame in the end. They started it after all! While he would freely admit to being something of a glutton when it came to food, he did not have a paunch! 

He rolled onto his back and ran a hand across his abdominal muscles reassuringly. No, he definitely did not have a tummy—even if he did do very little these days besides sleep.  He was handsome and very much alive while they were all dead and wrong. Hah! Good riddance to entire rotten lot. Honestly, should have turned to cannibalism ages ago during the leaner times. 

Of course as delicious as his brothers and sister had been, nothing compared to his favorite meal—man. 

No one knew why the Sirenae desired human flesh as they did since man was probably their closest cousin biologically. The Sirenae were human in appearance from the waist up except for their serrated teeth, but below the navel their bodies resembled that of a fish, only much more beautiful. The Sirenae ought to feel a kinship to man, but instead theu felt only an overwhelming urge to consume them.

When you could find a human that is….

He had only managed to wreck one small fishing trolley all winter with two scrawny crewmen aboard. They provided more entertainment than nourishment, and tasted like tar; however, even rancid meat was preferable to this endless monotony. 

He rolled onto his stomach and began drawing in the sand because it was something to do, but far into the distance, he heard a noise that might provide some respite. He slipped into the water and raced towards the the sound of the booming melody.  

Two large bodies emerged out of the blue-grey waters. The small pod of whales swam beneath the surface of a rough sea. He called to them as brothers and was rudely ignored. It was annoying but not unsurprising. The Old Ones tended to hold themselves above all other inhabitants of the sea for no reason except that they were simply larger than everyone else. 

He bared his teeth, and called again. Laughter returned to him on the current. It was a mirthless and condescending sound and irritating beyond measure.

"We hear you, Bottom Feeder. What do you want?"

He swam closer until he could see himself in the eye of the largest whale.

"News of the world abroad. It has been a long time since I have had visitors to my territory."

"Only because you treat this place like it is  **_your_ ** territory. The sea belongs to us all, yet you drive most away and eat all the rest."

"To each their own," he sings, but internally he wants to gouge-out the Old One’s eye. Territory was what you made of it, and he would not tolerate being preached to by this old bore. "Do you have news for me or not?” he asked curtly. 

"Haunty, demanding, rude—I am sure this is the one she spoke of," the smaller Old One said.

"I do not disagree," his mate returned.

_ She?  _ That seemed very strange. He had no other acquaintances other than the dead. 

"Bottom Feeder, the Albatross tells us to deliver this message: a boat approaches along this path. If you wait for it, you will dine well tonight."

A harbinger? That was stranger still, but the ill-omened were a strange lot in general.

"I may do that," he replied nonchalantly, but his stomach clenched in anticipation.

The more dominant creature laughed and slapped its tail against the water. The force of the disturbance sent the Sirenae tumbling end-over-end in an undignified way. He blushed with embarrassment and hot fury.  _ How dare they mock him. _ It didn't matter how mighty they thought they were. One day he'd find a song powerful to make even an One One's mind devour itself.

"It is amusing to me that you think you have a choice. Your kind are creatures of appetite not reason or personality. You will wait; you will feed; and afterwards you will hate the monotony of it because you have no soul for anything other than blood."

" _You don't know me, _ " he trilled in a sharp, angry staccato.

"I have known many of you in my time. You are all the same. I told her as much too, but she wanted to believe in you."

"Well you clearly don’t know everything since I am the **_only one_** left," he snarled in a low tenor.

He must have shocked them because temperature of the ocean dropped several degrees when the Old Ones ended their song abruptly.

"What happened to your kin?" the smaller whale asked.

He twisted gracefully in the water posturing for both of them. "I ate them—down to the last bone," he hummed.  If they thought him a monster then so be it. Let them see him as he was:  _ how strong he was.  _

"Then eat your fill, Bottom Feeder, but I think you will never fill that hole in your chest. Be gone from here. We are tired of your company."

"I assure you, the feeling is mutual."

…

The ship arrived exactly like the Albatross said it would, but they were still far from the sharp reefs and volcanic rock walls of his home island. In the old days, this would not have been a problem. The Sirenae would take turns in shifts whispering against the hull of the boat and subtly steering the crewmen off course. The tactic was so gradual and serene that the humans never took note of the encroaching danger. 

The strategy still worked. The only change was that he had only himself to rely on now. He did not mind it...much. The challenge only increased the fun, and who knew when the next opportunity for such excitement would come.

His lungs ached and burned by the time his island was in sight. It was mentally and physically exhausting doing this by himself, but the reward.... _ oh, the reward would be sweet. _ Only a little further and the men aboard would see the waves crashing against the rocks that would inevitably sink their ship. 

He bobbed at the surface of the choppy ocean and waited for the first alarm to sound. He could have sped things along by humming a few bars, but he never liked to rush a feast. The food tasted better when the meat was properly terrified.

The shouting began a little later. He let it spread until the volume rose above the sound of the roiling ocean before he opened his maw and began to sing.

The Sirenae had hundreds of songs with as many purposes: songs that compelled; songs that made the victim euphoric; songs that could kill with mercy. This song was none of those things. It was an original composition, which he had perfected it in isolation when the only disapproving eyes were those that remained half-digested in his stomach. It was a cruel melody and caused the kind of pain that broke men. Of all his creations, this was the one he took the most pride in. 

The pitch of the noise on deck changed as his song took hold of the crew. Correcting the ship's course became less and less of a priority as their minds fractured under the weight of the melody.  Men and women were falling disoriented into the surf.  They thrashed about trying to stay afloat while holding their hands to their ears to drown out the music. 

There was a booming crash as the ship struck a rock wall. There was no escape for the humans now. Each and everyone of them  _ now belonged to him. _

He tossed his head back and howled into the night. The moon hid behind a cloud as the carnage began.


	3. Salt and Gut

It was possible that he had overeaten last night. The sun was already past its midday zenith, but he dared not move from his favorite rock. He felt bloated and heavy enough to sink to the bottom of the ocean floor if he tried swimming. 

He rolled onto his back and ran a hand over his distended tummy. Okay, so maybe he did have a small paunch, but you know what? Worth it. Nothing compared to the hot, red blood of man—nothing at all. He was now doubly glad he had killed the others and would not have to share the leftovers.

In the immediate aftermath of the wreck, he had made short work of the two nearest humans. The first died quickly after he pulled the man under and ripped out his throat. The second met a more grisly end. Her screams began after her companion disappeared beneath the waves and crescendoed when he started taking small bites out of her calves and worked his way up her body.

Restored to full strength by the snack, he had made quick work of the rest. The only unfortunate thing about working alone was that he could not take his time with any of the kills if he wanted to keep what he caught. The sharks would be along soon to pick up his table scraps and that is if they were polite enough to wait their turn. In the past, most creatures native to this island paid deference to the Sirenae, but this was a new era. By dispatching with his family, he had upended the power differential and now had to work extra hard to keep the peasants in line. 

He drowned the remaining humans, temporarily piled them on the beach, and one by one transported them to a salt cave on the west end of the tiny island. There he sorted through the bodies, eating his fill where it pleased him and preserved the rest. If he was careful, he could snack on this reserve for months, but moderation was a concern for another day. He had gone so long without this kind of nourishment, he could not have stopped eating if he wanted to.

When properly sated, he swam back to his favorite cove away from the temptation of all those bodies full of blood and dozed intermittently in a state of suspended pleasure and pain.

He rolled onto his side and tucked an elbow beneath his head. Sleep was about to overtake him again, but before he closed his eyes, he saw another dead human lying on the sand. He nearly ignored it in favor of his nap, but then he began to think of the smell as the body began to burn bloat under the hot sun. The thought made his stomach churn, and the longer he waited, the worse the removal would be.

He slipped into the water with a groan and slowly swam to shore. It was no great effort to drag himself up the beach. He was used to hauling himself onto rocks and sandy beaches to sun himself, and his arms were well toned from decades of swimming.

The body lay on its stomach face-first in the sand. He flipped it over and received his second shock of the day. This man was still alive!

His stomach rumbled at the thought of another fresh helping of warm blood. . He shushed it knowing what a bad decision that would be. One more bite would probably put him in a coma for a week; there were limits even to his excesses.

For a moment, he considered slitting the man's throat and giving him to the sharks, but he rejected the thought as quickly as it had come. Why should they profit from his labor when they were not even going to say thank you? 

Hmm, it could not be helped. He would just have to make another trip to the salt cave with the body. What a waste of a sunny afternoon.

He placed a hand on the man's forehead and was about to bury his teeth in his throat when the human crinkled his nose and sneezed. It was a quiet, soft sound—more like a bird than any noise he had ever heard a human make. 

He froze, but the man lay still after that. He leaned down and blew across the tip of the man's nose and was rewarded by a repeat performance.

His desire to consume the human was replaced by an alien curiosity. He poked the man's bruised cheek, which produced a pained grunt, but the human remained otherwise catatonic. He lay down beside him and studied this strange creature.

Three things were immediate noticeable. One: he did not stink like most humans did. This one smelled like fish guts and the sea. He liked that. It was familiar and noninvasive, and it fit perfectly into his world 

Two: his hands were a web of old scars like he had wrapped them in cobwebs before falling into the ocean. They were beautiful and he wished to know them better. What stories would those hands tell when he woke? 

The final and most peculiar observation was that he felt...satisfied by the mere sight of this human. His pangs of constant hunger had ceased almost entirely. It was unsettling. That ache of hunger had been his only companion for most of his life. He felt empty without it, empty and tired.

He closed his eyes and let the sound of the man's breathing lull him into a sound sleep. 


	4. Rise

**** Will woke slowly from the nightmares that followed him into the water after the ship sank. One moment he was playing cards with the bosun and his mate then the screaming started. His memories were muddled after that, but his dreams were filled with blood and a terrible noise. 

Someone touched his face with fingers too delicate to belong to his shipmates. They were cool and smelled comfortingly like salt and apricots. Will leaned into the touch. It dulled the ache of this bruised cheek as he rose to full consciousness. He opened his eyes and felt warm breath on his face. He turned towards the other body and found himself looking into a pair of unfamiliar black eyes flecked with the most peculiar motes of red. He had never seen eyes like these before. They looked like chips of volcanic rock with their molten core still red hot and visible through the craquelure.

"Hi?" he said dumbly. 

Will’s companion stared back unblinking.

Will pushed himself up into a seated position and shut his eyes against the accompanying pain. He was pretty sure he pulled every muscle in his body and bruised the rest. When he could draw a steady breath through unclenched teeth, he opened his eyes once, and groaned when his brain registered what it was seeing.

_ ‘No way. No fucking way.’ _ Well he could add "concussion" to his list of injuries that was for damn sure. Will closed his eyes then counted to ten. When he looked again, the impossible sight remained. He shook his head a couple of time, but his vision still did not clear. 

The man beside him had a tail—a fishtail. 

"Am I dead?" he asked the...the merman.

The creature said nothing, but looked at Will expectantly.

"Don't look at me, buddy. Of the two of us, you're probably more informed than I am. Did you save me?"  _ A merman, he was talking to a fucking merman. Holy shit... _

The creature snorted like he was amused.  

"Have you seen any others like me?" Will asked and pointed at his chest. Belatedly, he realized how stupid it was to assume that the creature even understood English. 

But the merman nodded his head as if he could understand. Could this day get any stranger?

Will leapt to his feet and hooted excitedly. "That's great! Where are they?"

The merman shook his head in the negative this time.

"You don't know?" Will prompted.

Another no followed.

Will groaned and ran a hand through his tangled hair. This non-verbal communication wasn't working. “'No,  _ I don't know _ ,' or ' _ No, I do know _ ’,” he asked again. 

There was a huff of air from the creature's mouth that bore the distinct notes of frustration. The merman scraped a fingernail across his forearm, and the skin split beneath it like it had been cut with a scalpel.

"Hey!" Will shouted and tried to stop the crazy, masochistic creature from hurting himself, but the merman hissed at him. 

The creature wiped the blood off his arm and smeared it across his own neck and chest. He pointed at himself and his meaning was clear.

"They're dead," Will translated and slowly dropped back onto the sand with a heavy and weary thud. "They're  _ all  _ dead?"

The merman nodded and Will covered his face with his hands. Marooned on a island with a fictional creature. Great, just fucking great, and to think, he had been so happy to when he had been picked for this research expedition. 

Will looked up and saw that his companion had stretched himself onto the beach and fallen asleep. He was still covered in blood, but that didn’t seem to bother the creature. Will knew he needed to get moving. Certain things needed to happen if he was going to survive this ordeal. First, he needed to find a source of clean water and shelter from the elements. He already felt his skin beginning to itch after being under the sun for so long while he was knocked out, but Will was also a scientist and had been on an expedition to study South American sea lions before the shipwreck off the coast of Chile. He couldn’t just dismiss the greatest discovery in a century or more because of a little dehydration and sun sickness. So he lingered a while longer. 

The creature didn’t look like the cartoon versions of merfolk her was familiar with. His fin was more like a shark's tail with a small dorsal fin on his lower spin and a pair of anal fins on his front. His coloring was like that of a shark too. A white belly faded into mottled silver and charcoal grey denticles, but it was his pectoral fins that were truly stunning. They bore the closest resemblance to the delicate tail of a beta fish. The dark grey membrane faded into a translucent silver at the ends. Red spines, which were the color of a burgundy wine, divided the tail into sections. He suspected those spines served a defensive purpose and were probably poisonous as well much like a lionfish's fins were. Will wished he could ask his companion all his burning questions, but this non-verbal method of communication would make that difficult. 

That's something else that bothered, Will. From the waist up, the creature seemed entirely human.  So why had his vocal cords evolved differently when everything (except the tail) seemed so normal?  Although if Will was being honest with himself, normal wasn’t a fitting description for this being’s human half. Nothing about the creature's beauty was normal. The merman was lean, and his marble-white skin showed not a single mark of sun damage. His hair was yellow and silver, about shoulder length, and clipped back with a clam shell and a ragged piece of green fabric. In Ancient Greece, merfolk were said to be the children of Poseidon. Seeing the legend in the flesh, Will could believe this creature was the offspring of some deity. 

Since all his lab tech was at the bottom of the ocean and his subject fast asleep, there wasn’t much more Will could do that afternoon. Eventually the heat drove him from the beach.

After finding freshwater, he returned to the beach to find that his new friend was gone. There were marks in the sand that suggested he had dragged himself back out to sea, which is comforting. At least Will knew that he hadn’t imagined the whole thing. Will hastily constructed a lean-to where the beach and the forest met. Exhausted, lonely, and frightened, he laid down on a bed of palm fronds and watched the sun sink beneath a blood red ocean.  Sleep didn’t come easily that night, but somehow he caught a few hours of peace.


	5. Hello Again

Food was his primary motivator when he woke the next day. A lack of supplies remained his biggest problem, but fortunately he still had his knife on him when he went into the water as any good sailor would. Will used it to fashion a crude spear and waded out into the shallows to catch breakfast. There were large formations of rock and coral all over this cove, which provide excellent shelter for all manner of sea creatures. It was an All-You-Can-Eat buffet for the experienced fisherman. Fishing was never easy. Spear fishing was even worse, but Will was a good fisherman and he'd done this before during other stints in the field. It still took him a few hours before he came up with a good, clean kill. Like all things, this would require some practice. 

As Will lifted the dying fish, he noticed a pair of black eyes staring at him above the waterline and a few car lengths away. At this distance they looked matte black like a doll's eyes, and that wasn't the only difference. They... _felt_ different too, more predatory. His skin began to itch as some primordial warning system triggered the alarm. Will backed out of the slowly water keeping a careful eye on the creature. Once he had broken free of the surf, the merman dipped beneath the surface and was not seen again for the rest of the day.

The next morning, Will went down to the shore with his spear and discovered that he had an audience. The merman sat on top of an exposed rock in the middle of the cove. His eyes and fin were dazzling under the midmorning sun, and gone was the menacing feeling from the day before. He waved to Will until Will waved back and then settled in to watch the show.

Will was so nervous about being watched that he kept missing his target. After each failure, the merman made an odd clicking sound in his throat, which Will suspected might be laughter. In fact, he become certain of it after the creature fell off his rock during one such fit. 

But when Will finally caught a fish, the merman clapped excitedly and with sincerity. Feeling both proud and more confident, he caught the second fish of the day more easily to a similarly warm reception.

The creature slipped into the water at that point. The ocean was eerily calm today, and the surface of the cove was like glass. Will could tell that the merman was swimming towards him because of the ripples the creature left in his wake. Will opted for caution again and backed out of the water where he lacked the advantage.

The merman followed him and dragged himself onto the beach with an alarming amount of ease. 

_'So much for that advantage,'_ Will thought. Sea lions were particularly agile on land and could run faster than some humans.

Will sat down opposite the creature, but kept his spear close at hand. "Hello again."

The merman said nothing and barely moved except to breathe. 

"I'm pretty bad at this aren't I?"

The merman nodded and clicked his tongue twice. 

' _Is that a yes or chuckle?' _ Will wondered. Probably both. Geez, what a critic. "I got better," he grumbled and was pleased when the merman nodded his agreement without the tongue clicking this time. 

Will still wasn’t sure why the merman understood English so well. He knew that didn't make a bit of sense, but he wasn't going to look a gift horse in the mouth. He was talking to a goddamn mermaid after all. Logic was relative when dealing with the illogical. "My name is Will. Do you have a name?"

The merman looked contemplative then his eyes widened like this was the first time he'd ever considered the question. He shook his head and drew his fin up to his chest like a child hugging his knees.

Will felt a little guilty. He’d clearly made the creature sad, but how was he supposed to know that merfolk didn’t have names!? He scratched his head unsure of how to proceed. He was a biologist and much more comfortable working in a lab with non-sentient fish; however, he couldn’t keep thinking of this creature as just another animal or experiment _._ It seemed wrong and undignified. "I...could...give you a name. If you wanted one," he offered.

The merman perked up. He rocked forward and leaned into Will's space. Their faces were only two hands apart now. 

“Hey! Hey, give me a minute, will you?," Will said and put his palm against the merman's shoulder. Gently he pushed the creature away. "Let me get some wood. and I’ll think of something while I'm away. You'll stay here? We can cook this fish afterwards. I’m happy to share." 

A glint of menacing hunger passed through the merman’s molten eyes. 

“Or we could eat first!” he quickly amended. 

The merman made a pleased rumble in response. 

...

The merman was not where Will left him when he returned, but he was not far off either.  Will spotted him playing in the waves just offshore. 

Hel started his fire and cooked the fish. When the meat began to sizzle and char, the merman swam to shore and joined him.

Will gave him one fish and took the other for himself. The fish was bland, but it was still food. Will wolfed his down greedily and was picking bones out of his teeth while the merman continued to munch away at his slowly. Will noticed that he was very careful to hold his hand over his mouth as he chewed. Will didn’t want to give offense, but it was almost impossible not to laugh. Who knew merfolk held table manners in such high regard?

On the plus side, this gave Will more time to think up a name. He knew only something kingly would do, but Charles and Edward both seemed so pedestrian.

After plucking out the fish's eyeballs and popping them into his mouth like grapes, the merman focused his attention on Will with a serious but curious look.  _ ‘Time’s up,’ _ his posture said.

"Okay, what do you think about Louis?" Will asked hesitantly.

The merman shook his head and made a face.

Charlemagne, Richard, Alexander, Tamerlane, Genghis, and Caesar were also rejected in short order. The situation was getting dire now. Will was a marine biologist not a historian. He was rapidly running out of princes and conquerors. 

"How about Hannibal?"  something clicked into place as soon as he said like popping your ears on an airplane to relieve the pressure.

The merman chewed on that one for a long time, but did not immediately reject it outright as he had with the others.

"Do you like that one?"

His merman finally nodded enthusiastically. 

"Okay. It's nice to meet you, Hannibal,” Will said and extended his hand in greeting.

The next half-hour was spent trying to explain handshakes. 

…

Days turn into weeks. Will knew the island better now, and knew that he was pretty much fucked. Hannibal had helped him to recover a lot of necessary things: a pot to boil water in, spare knives, empty plastic bottles, but he was never able to find the ship’s radio. Will assumed that Hannibal was bringing these things up from the wreckage of the ship and that sharks had gotten to his shipmates; however, Hannibal was obnoxiously unhelpful when it came to the location of the _Ariadne_. When Will asked him, Hannibal shrugged and merely pointed at the sea so Will had simply stopped asking. It was easier to describe what he needed and let Hannibal fetch it for him.

"I should have named you, Fido" Will joked one day.  It was three days before Will saw Hannibal again.

Will spelled out an S.O.S. in the sand with rocks, but no rescue planes came nor were any ships ever spotted on the horizon. There was no way around it: this island was going to be home for the foreseeable future. At least he had the world’s best research project to keep him busy. 

Hannibal's latest hobby was mimicking Will's words and sentences, which improved their non-verbal communication as Will likewise learned to read Hannibal's lips and recognize his range of merchirps for the various emotions they represented. Hannibal tried to make the same shapes with his mouth even though he couldn’t produce the sounds, but this had led to one very unpleasant discovery. Hannibal had teeth—razor sharp, triangular teeth meant for biting and ripping through flesh.

Will suspected Hannibal had not meant to reveal this. The merman had been so careful when they ate together; however, since the revelation, his eating habits had changed drastically too. Hannibal no longer pretended to like cooked fish. When they ate together, Hannibal ate his fish raw. His table manners had vanished overnight too. Now, Hannibal made a point of showing his teeth to Will as he ate. It was unsettling to watch, but Will had learned not to react since he couldn't be sure what Hannibal's angle was with this peacocking.

Otherwise, life was oddly normal—considering that he was marooned on an island with a fairytale. Will spent most of his day hunting and fishing. The rest of his time was given to his studies of Hannibal and the local fauna, which mostly consisted of small birds and Humbolt penguins. Will liked the penguins and had named them all. They reminded him of his dogs, whom he probably wasn’t going to ever see again. In actuality, they were nothing like his dogs. His little family of strays were wild, unfriendly, and avoidant of Will's presence, but the were here and the dogs were not. The penguins were something to care about and Will needed the the distraction, needed it desperately.

It was dangerous to think of his own misery for too long.


	6. People Aren't Pets, Hannibal

That morning, Hannibal watched Will perform his daily routine with the penguins and pondered the penguin problem for the twentieth time. Will had been chasing those penguins for weeks now. To what end, Hannibal could not even begin to fathom. They were mean and pretentious beasts and too oily to be edible, but if Will wanted a penguin so badly, he needed only to ask. Hannibal would have gotten him a damn penguin already. Humans were morons.

After Will gave up for the day and resentfully returned to his fishing, Hannibal went work. He dove into the water and swam over to the rocks where Will's penguins liked to gather. When he was sure that Will was well beyond earshot, he began to sing a song of compulsion to bring the penguins to him. As soon as one was within reach he grabbed it and snapped its neck. The sound broke his song’s spell, and the other penguins fled in terror. They did not even attempt to reprimand him for the death of their brother— _those disloyal, nasty birds_.

Hannibal swam off to find Will before Will caught any more fish and ruined his appetite. He found his human where he expected him to be, hauling the crab traps from the water. Hannibal swam as close to shore as he possibly could but he could not haul himself onto the beach while carrying his burden.  

Will noticed that something was amiss and waded over to investigate.

Hannibal smiled in greeting and offered up his gift.

" ** _Hannibal!!!_** What have you done!?!" The voice belonged to Will, but it hardly sounded like him at all.

Hannibal frowned in confusion as Will splashed towards him wearing an expression Hannibal had never seen before. Hurt, anger, and alarm, contorted Will’s face in ways that made Hannibal’s chest constrict. He shrank away from Will when the human snatched the penguin away from him without so much as a thank you. Such rudeness was ordinarily rewarded by a swift dispatch to a watery grave, but Hannibal could scarcely refuse Will anything for reasons that remained a regrettable mystery to him.

Hannibal pushed back into the surf, but remained nearby to watch. What was so wrong about killing that wretched, little water fowl? Will killed things all the time: fish, lizards, other birds. He was efficient and remorseless in his hunting, which Hannibal quite admired. Why did penguins get all the special treatment when they insisted on ignoring him? It was not fair.

Will stood hip-deep in the water cradling the dead penguin like it was the most precious thing in the world to him. "Poor Franklyn. I'm sorry I dragged into this," he said.

Will walked out of the ocean and sat down on the beach near the waterline. The waves licked at his ankles as he cried and held the dead bird close to his chest.

The sound was awful, the most awful thing Hannibal had ever heard. It ate a him from the inside. The merman ducked below the waves to drown it out, but Will's pain followed him into the sea. Hannibal wanted to swim far away until he could no longer hear it, but he felt tethered to this place. If he stayed, Will might call to him. If he stayed, Hannibal had the opportunity to make things right.

He swam in slow circles around the cove until he heard his name on the current.

The merman popped his head above the waterline and saw his human waving him in. The penguin was no longer in his arms, but in the distance, Hannibal spotted a mound of freshly turned sand above the tideline. Hannibal swam to shore and dragged himself over to where Will sat. Sand clung to the tear tracks on his neck and face, but Will was no longer crying at least.

"I'd like to apologize for earlier," he said.

 _'About time.'_ Hannibal thought. He tried not to let his relief show since he was not sure what would set Will off again.

"You brought that penguin for me to...to eat, right?”

Hannibal nodded.

“It was a rare gift, and I could have refused it more politely. I’m sorry."

Hannibal nodded and smiled before he could stop himself. He cringed and waited to see if he had upset Will further.

But Will was staring at the ocean; he looked absolutely miserable.  "I named them after my dogs who I'll probably never see again. Have we ever talked about them? I wonder what'll happen to them if I never....oh," fresh tears welled in Will's eyes. "I miss them. I miss them so much."

None of this made any sense at all except that Will was still upset. Hannibal regretted the role he had played in that even if he still didn't get what was so important about that penguin. And what was a dog? If they were like penguins, he was sure he would not like them. Hannibal reached out and laid a hand on Will's leg hoping that his touch would pull Will away from his past and back to the island with him.

Will covered Hannibal's hand with his own and squeezed it reassuringly. "Penguins aren't food, Hannibal. They're pets. Do you understand what a pet is?"

Hannibal shook his head.

"A pet is something you care for. It's something you're responsible for. You've got to protect it because it can't protect itself. Do you get it now?"

Hannibal nodded and took his hand back. He pointed at Will to indicate that he understood that Will was his pet.

Will's blue eyes widened. "No! No, no! Hannibal, no. I'm not your pet.” Will grabbed both of Hannibal's hands. He laid one palm on his own chest above his heart, and placed the other over Hannibal's heart. "We're the same. Equals. I’m not your pet; _I’m your friend_ , Hannibal. Understand?"

Hannibal was sure he did not understand, but he knew that was not what the human wanted so he nodded.  Will was not his equal in any physical sense. Humans were weak and generally stupid. They were prey to the Sirenae and nothing more, and yet Hannibal felt both hearts beating at the same tempo. That at least was the same.

Will's grip loosened believing that he had made his point, but Hannibal was loathe to separate. It was surprisingly pleasant being touched in this way. Humans were so warm when they were still alive, and Will had almost never initiated physical contact before. Normally he seemed afraid to do so. Hannibal made the impulsive decision to tackle Will, which was difficult to do. He was awkward and graceless on land. It was only because Will had not been expecting it that Hannibal succeeded at all.

Will flailed but Hannibal pinned his arms in the sand. The merman could smell adrenaline and fear rolling off his human in waves. Hannibal nuzzled his hair and luxuriated in the scent. He liked the tart taste of the first much more than the bitterness of the later.

When Will finally settled, Hannibal released him and lowered his head to Will's chest to listen to his heartbeat. _Thump-thump-thump._ It was the finest composition Hannibal had ever heard: strong, steady, and resolute. _Thump-thump-thump._ He wished he could lay here forever.

"Hannibal?" Will said nervously, but the merman tuned him out. If Will asked him to move explicitly then he probably would. Denying Will was more trouble than obeying him since the first made him fussy and the second made him radiant; however, until then, here is where he would stay.

Will draped an arm around his shoulder and did not ask him to move for many hours.


	7. Where We Belong

At first, Will thought his lean-to had sprung a leak, but the water, which dripped onto his face and neck, was cold and tasted like salt. That could mean only one thing; Hannibal had once again dragged himself up the beach to watch him sleep. This behavior had first manifested three nights ago after the penguin incident. Will didn't know exactly what to make of it so he pretended to be asleep each time it happened.

Usually, Hannibal went away after what Will guessed was about an hour of being a creep; however, tonight, Hannibal lifted the palm fronds off Will’s back and laid down beside him instead.

Will blew his cover when Hannibal's cold-blooded body nuzzled up to him. He flinched away from the chill, and Hannibal trilled a note that sounded like a question.

"It's okay," Will whispered to the darkness then felt Hannibal's arm fall across his waist.

Will repressed a troubled groan. He was beginning to suspect he had somehow bungled the whole friendship conversation. While Will was certain Hannibal no longer viewed him as his pet, he worried he might have just become the merman's boyfriend.  _ 'Way to go, Graham. You certainly know how to pick them. _

He glanced over his shoulder but could only see a sliver of Hannibal’s yellow hair in his periphery. Will knew he must be sun-drunk because all he could think of in that moment was how pretty it looked in the moonlight.

He turned away and buried his face in the crook of his elbow.  _ ‘Get a grip on yourself,’  _ he ordered, but during the night his other hand found Hannibal's hand instead. 

Will woke at dawn and pried his hand loose before Hannibal woke up. He waited nervously until the merman stirred and finally rolled away. 

Will sat up and made a whole production of stretching like he hadn't already been awake for a while.  "Morning," he fake yawned.

Hannibal responded with an unenthused chirp. He sat up, cracked his back, and glared balefully at the rising sun. 

"Not a morning person, eh?" Will laughed.

Hannibal turned his annoyed gaze on Will. His eyes flashed red for the briefest moment as those mottled irises of his caught the morning light. 

"Easy, easy, I'm only teasing." Despite their earlier conversation about pets and equals, Will found himself using the same voice with Hannibal he usually used to pacify his dogs. As human as Hannibal was **most of the time** , there was something prehistorically feral about the merman, which Will could never fully dissociate from. 

Will’s apology was followed by another merchirp, which sounded tired but no longer annoyed. Hannibal tried to slick his hair back, but his bangs remained salt-straight and in his face.

Will chuckled, which landed him in trouble yet again with the shark-toothed merman. 

"Leave it. I like it like that,” he said.

This had an instantaneous effect. Hannibal sat up straighter and preened with a self-satisfied smile.

_ 'Vain thing,'  _ Will thought, but wisely kept this remark to himself. 

He noticed Hannibal scratching his fin, which must also be uncomfortably dry from being out of the water for so many hours. Will reached for one of the plastic Coke bottles, which Hannibal had retrieved for him from parts unknown. This was how Will transported fresh water from the inland stream to his beach camp. He twisted off the top and poured some water over the aggrieved patches of scale.

Hannibal flashed him an appreciative look; Will didn't hesitate about opening a second bottle. 

As Will tended to his friend's sand-chaffed anatomy, Will noticed how changed the fishtail was from the first time he’d seen it. Chunks of scale were missing and scabbed over or deeply scored from being dragged up and down the sandy beach all the time. It was a grizzly, ugly sight. 

"Oh no," Will choked as he ladled more water onto Hannibal's animal half.  _ He would be scarred,  _ Will realized. He reached out and gently touched one of the roughened patches of dentin, and that was enough to draw a pain breath from the merman. This beautiful creature—the greatest scientific find of the century—had been marked and ruined by him. Will felt wounded. "Please, Hannibal, stop doing this to yourself. It's not like I'm going anywhere."

Hannibal shook his head decisively rejecting his request.

Will looked into the eyes of his merman who glared back at him with determination. "You're not going to listen to me are you?"

Hannibal snarled at him, which was a new reaction. Will guessed this was his version of a hard no. 

"Then do me a favor, and let me help you. Don't drag yourself across the sand anymore than you have to. Understood?"

Hannibal blinked. His expression shifted from irritation to confusion. He shrugged, shook his head, and pointed from Will to the water.  _ 'How?' _ the motions translated to.

"I'll show you," he said and crouched beside the merman. "Put your arms around my neck."

Will scooped Hannibal up in his arms. He wished he could say he'd done it as easily as a knight rescuing his princess, but he could not. Hannibal was lean, but he was also solid muscle. It was fortunate that weeks of hard labor and an absence of alcohol had transformed Will's frame into one capable of bearing such a load, but it was not a Norman Rockwell picture.

He huffed and puffed and trudged towards the water’s edge carrying Hannibal like his bride. 

The merman trembled in his arms, and buried his face in the crook of Will's neck making sad, nervous noises. It occurred to Will that being held aloft like this was strange, new, and probably unpleasant for this sea creature. Guilt rose up in him. He clutched there merman tighter to his chest. 

"It's alright, Hannibal, I'm not going to drop you,” he said soothingly. He should have just kept his mouth shut because he stumbled three steps later and did exactly that. 

Hannibal wailed as they fell forward; it sounded like a gun going off in Will’s ear.

Hannibal hit the ground first. Will tripped over his body and fell across his lap.

"Sorry! Ow! Christ, Hannibal! Can you please stop making that noise before you burst my eardrum?"

The merman's painful chittering cut off abruptly. 

Will sat up and wiped the sand off his face. He rubbed his ear. The ringing began to subside, but it still hurt like hell. "Geez, you could break rocks with those pipes of yours," he joked, but Hannibal wasn't laughing. 

The merman held his hands in his lap. His knuckles were white with tension, and he looked at Will worriedly. 

"I'm fine. Are you okay?"

"Look, I'm sorry. I'm really sorry. Would you mind if we tried again? I'll do my best not to drop you this time, but from now on, I won't make any promises I might not be able to keep. Fair enough?"

Hannibal sighed and held his arms out.

Will picked him up and they made it to the water's edge without incident. Will walked into the surf and gently lowered Hannibal into the water.

The merman wiggled out of his arms and submerged himself. When he came up, he slicked his bangs back in his usual style. 

Will thought the merman would swim away to stretch his “sea legs” after a long, cramped night on land, but Hannibal lingered and watched Will with interest. It was the look that used to make Will nervous, the hungry one, but it failed do so anymore. Something had changed between them since those early days, but who had softened first? 

Hannibal swam up to him and grabbed him by the hands. Will let himself be drawn into deeper water although every instinct told him not to go with the merman. The sandy bottom gradually slipped away. When Will was left treading water on a choppy sea, Hannibal began to smile with all his teeth showing, and Will remembered to be afraid. 

The merman dipped beneath the surface.

Will corkscrewed in the water, frantic and searching. Hannibal was nowhere to be seen, but Will felt his passing. When the merman zipped by, a wall of pressure hit him from below or from the side depending on Hannibal's trajectory. Will had seen this behavior before in his studies of marine mammals and sharks. It was a hunting technique. This must be how the seal felt before it fell into the orca's gullet. Will briefly considered whether he he had misjudged the merman's overtures of friendship.

A hand closed around his left ankle. It was lucky that Will was pulled under before he had time to scream, which kept him from swallowing a belly full of water.

Hannibal released him as soon as he had pulled Will under.

Will broke through the surface gasping from shock more than a lack of oxygen. His curly bangs hung limp over his eyes and ears.

Hannibal did not try again, but Will wasn’t sure where he’d gotten to now. The morning grew quiet; not even a gull broke the stillness. With no warning, Hannibal breached the surface of the water.  Will watched transfixed as the merman arched through the air gracefully. His grey scales flashed silver and and gold depending on how the light hit them.  Will gapped. The image was so shockingly beautiful, he thought he'd never see anything more lovely.

All too soon, Hannibal slipped back beneath the surface. The wave created by his reentry crested over Will’s head and shocked him out of his reverie. Will spit out a mouthful of salt water and began to laugh. 

The merman’s smiling face popped back up above the waterline. His sharp teeth were on full display still, but it was clear that is intent was play not murder.

“You are such a brat,” Will said and splashed him.

Hannibal splashed back.

It was complete chaos for the rest of the morning. They chased after each other and played tag like children did. Will taunted Hannibal from the shallows when he needed a rest. Hannibal dunked him whenever Will dared the deeper water. They splashed, hooted, and chirped like they had never been happier. It was Christmas morning. It was the birth of one’s first child. It was the happiest day of their lives.

By midday, Will knew it was time to call it quits. His skin was pruny and his eyes burned because of all the saltwater. Plus, he still needed to hike inland and return with fresh water since he'd used so much of his reserves tending to Hannibal this morning. 

As the sun passed from the eastern half of the sky into the west, Will returned to the shore where he belonged.  He looked back at the surf searching for the flip of a fin of a flash of yellow hair, but Hannibal was already gone. 

_ _


	8. For Better or Worse, In Sickness and Health

Things were going so well until Will developed a fever. He recovered, but Hannibal still grappled with a lingering sense of dread. The Sirenae did not catch colds after all. This was a problem his kind never had to deal with, but humans were weak, fleeting things. Hannibal had been on the cusp of forgetting that because Will seemed so unlike other humans, but this fever had brought it all back to the forefront of his thoughts.

Hannibal watched from a rock as Will fished, and the merman could not help but notice the shivering that sometimes overtook him. Will gave up for the day without catching anything. Will had weathered the temperate months just fine, but the water was cold and getting colder. On cooler days, Will stayed warm by being active, but winter on this island could be cold for a warm blooded creature like his human. If Will was already struggling….

There were things that might help—an extra few layers of protection against the elements like the clothes Will’s former shipmates had wore for instance. Many of those corpses were still buried and preserved in the salt cave. Of the ones that Hannibal had already eaten, their personal belongings were stacked nearby in case he found a use for them later. Hannibal suspected that ‘later’ meant now, but there was still one major problem: how would Will react to such assistance?

Hannibal was not sure how much Will knew or even suspected. The merman had been very careful when choosing what flotsam to gift Will from the wreckage to keep questions to a minimum. What would he do if he knew Hannibal had not just withheld things, but was also responsible for his stranding and for the death of his friends and crew?  After that disastrous incident with the penguin, Hannibal did not think it would be a positive reaction. But if presented with the choice—survival or morality—which would Will choose?

Before that happened, Hannibal had a choice of his own to make. Did he help Will thus exposing himself to Will's anger and possible retribution or let him die?

…

The merman woke up the next morning when Will began to cough. The indecision of the previous day disappeared the moment he heard that wet, terrible rattle. Hannibal tried to fend Will off when the human attempted to pick him up and carry him down the beach as had become their morning ritual. The stand-off dragged on and on, and in the end, Hannibal lost. 

The merman noticed too many things when he was in Will's arms. The human’s skin was warmer than it should be.  His steps were slower too, and by the time they reached the waterline, Hannibal was in a full blown panic regarding Will’s health and convinced that Will might expire at any given moment.

He gestured at Will to put him down. When he did not, Hannibal thrashed until Will was forced to drop him. The merman hit the ground hissing. He twisted onto his side and rubbed his mistreated tailbone, which was almost surely bruised.

“I’m sorry! I just…you were….oh God, Hannibal I’m so sorry. Are you okay? I didn’t mean to drop you.” Will said and fussed over him.

Hannibal pushed him back and held him at arm’s length until his message about personal space clicked into place. He mimed the action of using a knife and pointed at Will’s hip where the human kept his.

“Uh, sure,” Will said as he flipped the blade open and gave it to Hannibal hilt fist.

Hannibal carved a map of island into the wet sand—or what he assumed the island looked like based on his many memories of swimming along the coast.  Two parallel lines represented where they were. He pointed at himself and at Will with the blade to emphasis that point. An X marked the salt cave. Hannibal drew a line between the two points.

Will scratched his head. “You want me to go there?”

Hannibal nodded enthusiastically and beside the map drew a second illustration of the entrance of the salt cave. Then he closed the knife and handed it back to its owner.

“Why?”

The look Hannibal gave Will was determinedly irritated.  _ ‘This is not open for discussion, _ ’ his body language said.

Will sighed heavily.  “Okay, we’ll do it your way.”


	9. The Ariadne

Finding the cave took almost all day. First, Will followed the sun to the west end of the island, and found a cliff that looked suitably like Hannibal's drawing—or so he thought from his perspective as a landlubber. He navigated his way down to the water only to discover that he'd picked the wrong rock wall and had to climb back up again. He did this three more times before he finding what he thought might be the cave. Whatever surprise Hannibal had waiting for him, it better be worth it. 

Will slipped into the water and stumbled towards the entrance. The water was waist deep, but fortunately there was enough overhead clearance to enter without needing to dunk himself in the ice cold ocean. Once inside, the cave opened up into a wide and opera-esque hall. The salt smell was heavier here, much heavier, and in the distance there was a faint yellow glow that looked impossibly like...like an artificial light.

Will walked towards it and studied his surroundings.  _ 'It's a salt cave,' _ he realized and then spied Hannibal. The merman sat looking prim and severe on a landing at the back of the cave. With his fin folded beneath him he looked like a samurai except that instead of a sword he held a flashlight across his lap.

Will let loose a triumphant holler. A flashlight! This was a real treat! He'd all but given up hope of ever finding one. A flashlight would make checking the ground traps at night a lot easier. "Hannibal! That's great! Is this what you wanted to show me?"

The grim expression on Hannibal's face cut his celebration short.

"Are you okay? What's wrong?"

The merman offered no response and pointed the flashlight at a shadowed corner revealing a massive pile of stuff.

Will pulled himself onto the landing and cautiously approached the pile. The muscles in his chest were locked in a fearful knot. Something felt wrong. Something felt terribly wrong. Why did Hannibal look so miserable?

The pile contained a lot of things: coats, knives, watches, and more. Will even saw a rescue flare nestled among the debris. Every one of these things was  _ familiar  _ to him, and they should be.  "The Ariadne. This is all from the wreck," he said. The doomed science expedition now seemed like a lifetime ago, but the horror and despair of those early days was starting to come back in the presence of all these familiar things.

Hannibal made a peculiar sound, which Will had never heard before.  Frustration seven levels deep punctuated the heartbroken keen. It was internal. It was external. It was too many things at once. 

"Hannibal why is this stuff here," Will asked. He didn't like the way his voice sounded. Despite the cavernous expanse, his words did not echo.  Will felt small and vulnerable in that cave. The shadows drained his words of any firmness they might have had. Will turned towards Hannibal moving at a speed that made a tortoise look like a cheetah.

The merman sat with his head bent low looking guilty as sin and held the hilt of the flashlight out to Will. When Will took the flashlight from him, the merman pointed deeper into the darkness with a long, delicate finger.

Shaking, Will stepped towards the darkened corner of the cave and swept the light across the floor and walls. Bones and black stains carpeted the pearlescent salt structure—human bones.

“Oh…so that’s what happened.”

The fairytale was ending, but there would be no happily ever after for either of them.

Will whirled on the merman, angry but speechless. He was almost as mad at himself as he was at Hannibal to be honest. Will was a biologist and a student of predators. On some level, he must have known where he stood on the food chain in relation to the Hannibal.  So many behaviors made sense now. "You killed them,” he said. His was voice biting and accusatory. “ My friends...you… **you ate** them. Didn’t you?”

Hannibal lpeeled back his lips exposing his teeth and hissed in fearsome confirmation of the dreaded truth.

"You were going to eat me,” Will realized as the he thought back on how Hannibal had watched and studied him in the earliest days of their acquaintance. 

The only change in Hannibal's posture was a fleeting widening of his eyes, but he did not try to deny it.

Standing, Will loomed over the merman, but it was still Hannibal's presence that overwhelmed the space. He sat straight backed and unashamed. His eyes were hard and daring.  _ 'This is who I am. Do you see me now?' _ his body language proclaimed for the world.

Oh, Will saw it all right. He saw everything. Once one connection had been made, the rest clicked together like LEGO blocks.  "The ship. You brought it here, somehow, you brought it here. I remember now." The night the crew went into the water they hadn't been alone, there had been music and blood. Something had picked his shipmates off one-by-one, but it had missed him somehow. Will thought it had been sharks at the time, but it was Hannibal all along. This wasn't some damn Disney movie, it was a goddamn Greek tragedy. "You ruined my life!!!"

If there had been more light or if Will had been less angry, he might have noticed the glossy sheen across Hannibal's black eyes.

"Why? Why not kill and eat me like the rest? Why even bring me here to this cave? Is it my turn?”

There was no response.

“Was this fun for you? Being nice. Playing house. Making me...like you. Or were you just playing with your food?" Will spat.

Hannibal's posture softened. He lifted an arm and reached for Will's hand, but Will raised the flashlight intending to strike him with it. 

When Hannibal flinched away from him, Will felt an overwhelming surge of revulsion towards himself. He staggered away before he could do anything rash, justified or not. “Stay away from me! I don't want to see you anymore."

The cave was silent except for the hammering of his heart. Will walked away without looking back and eased himself into the water. He took the flashlight because it was useful, waterproof, and already in his hands. He could not tolerate the thought of riffling through his shipmates possessions at that moment and certainly not in front of Hannibal.

As Will made the arduous climb up the cliff face, he heard a blood curdling keen from inside the cave. It was louder than what should be humanly possible given the theoretical lung capacity of a creature Hannibal's size, but Hannibal wasn't human after all. He was magic, sinew, and shadow wrapped in a beautiful package. Will saw that now. "And he'll probably be the death of me sooner or later, "he murmured as pulled himself over the edge.

The cries continued below. Will beat it out of there as fast as his legs could carry him. He didn't want to listen to them any longer than he had to. He'd be hearing them again soon enough in his nightmares.

  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Final chapters to be uploaded on Monday! 
> 
> Fun Fact: this chapter was originally titled "Denile is not in Egypt, Will" but it didn't feel like it fit the tone of a break-up chapter. XD
> 
> Edit: "De nile is not in Egypt, Will" Looking at me, messing up my own joke. smh


	10. What We Can't Live Without

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SOOOOOO, the Patriots lost yesterday. Why does this matter? Well because instead of editing all four remaining chapters, I only got done with two because BLARGH. WE GOT SHUT-OUT AT FOXBORO AND IMA GONNA NEED TO FLIP A DOZEN MORE TABLES BEFORE THAT IS OKAY. 
> 
> Final two chapters on Wednesday. *flips a few tables, stabs a couple of things, plays Bach's Goldberg Variations: Aria, and sulks in the meantime*

Hannibal did not leave the cave for days. He lived off what bodies remained and was complete glutton about it too. Eating the rest of Will's friends seemed only fair after the abuse Hannibal had received for their deaths. If the merman had been able to move after that excess, he probably would have hunted down every penguin on the island next and left them on the beach for Will to find. Or maybe he would have parceled the bodies out slowly. A beak here. An organ there. Everyday another little reminder of just how monstrous he **_could_ ** be if he did not crave Will’s approval so much. Why did this human hold such sway over him? The indignity of it was nearly as bad as his present loneliness.

It was ridiculous that he should be made to suffer like this for something that was entirely beyond his power to change. Since he couldn’t bring the dead back to life, what was so wrong about making use of their possessions? Will should be thanking him for providing him with the means to survive. What gave him the right to be such an ungrateful ass?

_Idiot._

_Fool._

_Will._

_Will....please._

In the end, his frustration always gave way to sorrow, and Will's face, twisted anger, rose before him to admonish him again for his brutality. 

Hannibal could not remember the last time he cried. It was a wretched feeling. At times he considered ripping his own heart out just to end the pain, but he did not like the idea of dying before Will did. It seemed like a defeat but one that was starting to look acceptable. Hannibal also briefly considered his original plan of simply eating Will so some part of him would remain with Hannibal always, but he did not like the idea of Will dying at all. Ugh, none of this was fair.

When Hannibal could no longer stomach living like a pathetic hermit crab, he left the cave and went looking for Will despite his orders to the contrary.

He did not find the human in any of the usual places, and Will's beach camp looked like it had not been used in days.

When night fell, Hannibal dragged himself onto the beach and curled up on top of the bed of leaves, which he used to share with Will. With the human's scent blanketing him, it was easy to fall asleep. He did this for the next three nights. 

On the third night, a noise woke Hannibal up shortly before morning. He opened his eyes and saw Will standing over him wrapped in the last rays of moonlight. Hannibal rolled over onto his back and smiled; Will frowned in return.

The human did not lay down, but he did not leave either. Indecision kept him rooted in place. There were two paths they both knew he could take: strike down his enemy or walk away from his former friend. Will might not know his own mind, but Hannibal knew which he preferred.

The merman sat up and ran his hand up Will’s leg until he found the pocket where the human kept his knife. Hannibal removed it and offered the blade to Will.

Will took it, and Hannibal extended his own neck to him. If this was the only way Will would forgive him then he could be content with dying.

"Hannibal," the human growled. "What do you think you're doing?" He threw the knife away and followed the blade to the ground. Will landed on his knees in front of Hannibal and grabbed the merman's face with his hands. 

“I’m not going to kill you, Hannibal,” Will said, “but I have to deal with you, and my feelings about you.” His thumb began to stroke Hannibal's lips.

The merman shivered. This was not the reaction he had expected. It was pleasant, tender, and he quite liked it up until Will pushed his thumb into his mouth.

The merman tried to pull away before he hurt Will, but the human grabbed a fistful of his hair with his other hand and held Hannibal still. Blood filled his mouth as Will intentionally cut himself on Hannibal’s teeth.

Both men cried out and broke apart.

Will fell backwards onto his butt and stared at the red stream of blood pouring from the wound on his tumb.

Hannibal was in far worse shape. He clapped his hand over his mouth and angled his body away from Will. The human’s blood slicked his mouth and throat, and made him ache with hunger. He shook with a primal need as old as the ocean. The taste of Will’s blood was overwhelming. It was everything he had ever wanted. It was the only thing he would ever want again. There were tears in his eyes so he shut them as he grappled with his monstrous appetite. 

_No._

_Do not do this._

Will was not food. He was more than that. He was special. 

When Hannibal was confident he would not turn on Will, he moved to face the human fearful of what he would see. The merman was sure he would find Will watching him with disdain having just witnessed his animal half nearly seize control, but Will wasn’t looking at Hannibal at all. He was busy examining his own wound and the blood staining his palm. Will raised his thumb to his mouth and began to suck the wound clean.

Hannibal nearly succumbed again to the sight and smell of it so the merman sat motionless and waited for Will to conclude his medical ministrations. He did not trust himself to make the first move.

When the blood flow lessened, Will crawled over to Hannibal. He touched the merman’s face with both hands and forced Hannibal to look at him. “Hey, I'm not going to kill you and I can’t stay mad at you either. I love you, Hannibal," and then the human did something strange. 

Hannibal loved a lot of things. He loved food. He loved music. He loved playing in the waves at sunrise. But he did not know what it was like to be loved until that moment when Will pressed his lips against his. The human’s lips were rough because of all the sun and salt he was regularly exposed to and also surprisingly gentle. They moved against Hannibal’s mouth in an odd and pleasing way. It was a lot to figure out and process, and at first, Hannibal was unresponsive to his advances.

When Will began to pull away, Hannibal grabbed his hair and pulled the human’s lips back to his since hair pulling had already been established as acceptable behavior for this kind of thing. Will chuckled as they butted lips and untangled Hannibal’s hand from his hair by knitting their fingers together.

“You’ve never been kissed before have you?” Will managed to say between breaths.

Hannibal pushed back only long enough to let Will see him shake his head and dove back in. He dove a little too forcefully, and they fell over with Hannibal ending up on top.

Will grunted as Hannibal wiggled into a more comfortable position, but the human did not sound like he was in pain. It was a good sound. Hannibal liked it very much, and smiled broadly to show Will exactly how much he liked it forgetting that his teeth were still stained red with the human's blood.

Will’s eyes grew somber and contemplative. 

Hannibal flinched when he realized what he’d done.

“I don’t care, Hannibal. I like it when you smile.”

Hannibal beamed at Will, arched his back, and trilled a note of happiness into the air.

Will’s hand stroked the length of his back and traced the ridges of his vertebrae. Hannibal hardly knew what to do with himself. Will had never touched him like this, and it felt wonderful. Hannibal stretched into the human's caresses and let Will take what he wanted since it was clear he was more experienced. A certain amount of physical contact was always necessary when they slept together for warmth or when Will carried him up and down the beach, but this wasn't that. This was something more familiar. It was covetous, and it was hungry.

But Hannibal was content to passively participate for only so long and eventually went back to kissing. He kissed Will’s forehead, his nose, both ears, and any other place he could reach. When Hannibal found Will’s neck and kissed him there several times, he felt Will writhe beneath him and make that noise again. It really was a good noise.

But before Hannibal could explore this new found power he had over the human, Will flipped Hannibal over onto his back.

The merman chirped in surprise and then annoyance when his head struck a rock buried beneath the sand.

“Sorry,” Will panted, "but you learned faster than I expected.”

Hannibal tried to kiss him again, but Will pulled back and shook his head.

“Not right now, Hannibal. I need a moment. Making-out is one thing, but I’m not sure I’m emotionally ready for anything else tonight even if I knew how it was biologically possible.”

Hannibal clicked his tongue and glared.

Will laughed and laid down beside Hannibal. “You are the greediest individual I have ever met,” he said as he stroked Hannibal’s hair, “and I love you.”

Hannibal tried once more to kiss Will, and this time the human allowed it. Hannibal wanted more of course, but again Will cut him off.

“Tomorrow,” he said and drew Hannibal into a tight embrace. “We’ll do more of that tomorrow. I promise.”

In the morning, Hannibal held him to that promise in spades.

 


	11. The Fairytale Ends

The next afternoon, they returned to the salt cave and brought everything that was useful back to camp.

It was a quite, unpleasant day. Will might love Hannibal, but he had clearly not forgiven him yet.  The human’s mood grew darker while he sorted through the bones and dismembered body parts in order to bury the friends he could identify. The rude were kept and given a new purpose since even Will had to admit that the remaining bones could be useful in a variety of ways such as being sharpened into tools. 

They did not “make-out” that night. Will was cold and guarded that evening, but Hannibal was able to coax him out of his melancholy the next morning to their mutual relief.

Will's attentions that morning were more passionate than before. There was a voracious possessiveness in his touch and fire in his kisses, which Hannibal found quite alluring and very Sirenae-like. In as little as a day, something drastic had changed inside Will, Hannibal noticed. Accepting the fate of the _Ariadne_ and finally burying the dead had freed him from his final ties to his past.  Finally, Will belonged in his world now. 

Other than the kissing, things were back to normal for them, except for the weather, which was growing colder every day. Will could no longer swim with Hannibal in the ocean because of the dropping temperature. Hannibal mourned the loss of their playtime but made up for it by snuggling up to Will any chance he got.

Hannibal was so happy that he fooled himself into thinking that everything was going to be okay.

But he was wrong…so wrong. One day Will woke up with a very and a cough; it was much worse than the last time. 

Hannibal did everything he knew to do, but Will was not getting better this time.

He was dying.

On the seventh morning since Will got sick, Hannibal sat on his favorite rock in the middle of the cove where he had first laid eyes on his human and again contemplated whether it would be better and easier to just kill and eat Will for practical reasons. Hannibal had given up any romantic illusions about eating Will and recognized that consuming him was not the same as keeping him. Nothing could replace Will when he was gone, and the world would be much bleaker for it, but Hannibal could at least give Will a clean death and end both their suffering.

Or there was option two, which was equally distasteful: send Will home to be cared for by his own kind. 

Hannibal had put it off for as long as he could, but the time had come to decide. He would have to leave tonight while Will still had the strength to fend for himself for a few days if he decided to let him go.

The merman swam back to shore and made his patient eat a double portion of fish broth. Afterwards, Hannibal kissed Will goodnight and tucked him into bed.

Hannibal made up his mind as he watched Will drift off to sleep. He engraved every detail about the human into his mind so he could at least revisit him in his memories after he was gone. Then the merman dragged himself down the beach and slipped into the ocean.

He swam for a full day before he found a ship and used his voice to change its course. It took longer than he'd expected. He had no heart for the task, which diminished his power. 

When the ship reached their home, it was an easier thing to compel the crewmen ashore where they found a man half-dead and starving.

Hannibal hid behind some rocks and watched as they carried an unconscious Will onboard. Will never even woke up to call out his goodbyes.

The men made several more trips ashore to investigate the camp and retrieve his personal effects.

Hannibal swam as close as he dared and watched. Among the fishing gear and the shell necklaces, which Hannibal had made for Will when he was bored, they found the bone collection. The men wore the same expressions of horror he had seen on Will’s face back in the cave, and Hannibal cursed himself. He should have disposed of the bones before he left. They would almost certainly cause Will trouble now that he was back among his own people. Oh well, too late now.

Too late...

As the ship motored away, Hannibal let himself sink down onto the ocean floor. He curled up in a fetal position and finally allowed himself to scream. Every fish within a one mile radius died instantly.

 

 


	12. Forgiveness

Some part of him thought that Will might return after he recovered, but three summers passed and no ships ventured near the island. It was also possible that Will had died on the journey home. Hannibal was not sure which would be worse so initially he chose the ending where Will was alive and had decided to stay among the humans where he belonged—abandonment seeming like the lesser of two evils. 

Hannibal thought he would be okay with that since he had been perfectly content with his life before the human’s arrival.  Will had been disruptive. He had been confusing. He had been messy, and yet Hannibal wanted nothing more than to see him again.

Will had changed him; it was the worst sort of injustice. What had Hannibal ever done to deserve this kind of pain?

Well he was done with it now—with all of it. “Fuck it,” as Will would say. Hannibal had decided to remove himself from the situation.

He lay on top of the ruins of their former beach camp, and here he would stay until he died of either heartache or starvation (they felt about equally awful). He wished he had thought of this plan sooner while the camp still smelled like Will. Alas, another missed opportunity. He had missed so many opportunities. 

The merman had grown weak with hunger and doubted he had the strength to crawl back into the ocean even if he wanted to. His beautiful fin was dry and had cracked in places, and his hair...well, he did not even want to think about his hair. In short, he was a mess—a miserable bloody mess.

A white bird walked along the water’s edge. Hannibal watched it until his eyelids grew too heavy to remain open. He rested for a moment and when he looked again, the bird was gone. A woman stood in its place dressed in a flowing white gown.

Perfect. Another human. Because that had worked out  **_so_ ** _**well**_ for him the last time. Maybe this one would be kind enough to kill him before they abandoned him although Hannibal did not see where she could be carrying a knife.

He tried to sit up and could only manage to raise himself onto one elbow as she walked towards him. He hissed at her, or tried to anyway, and began to cough instead. 

“Wow, and this from the man who once said that suicide was the enemy. If only the others could see you now. Chilton would laugh until he shit himself.”

Everything about her felt familiar. Why? Hannibal was sure he had never met another human until Will—none he had left alive anyway.

“You surprised me, Hannibal. I think you surprised them too. You finally learned to put someone’s interests entirely above your own. I wasn’t sure you could do it when I sent Will to you. ”

_ ‘What? _ ’ Hannibal mouthed silently.

But if she understood, she ignored him. “I’ve come to help you if you. Believe me, I’m just as shocked as you are,” she laughed until tears leaked out of her eyes. “You passed my test, and I’m actually kinda glad about that. It means that I can finally be proud of you, and maybe, I think I can even forgive you,” she said and offered her hand to him.

Hannibal hesitated, but decided he had nothing else to lose. She was probably a delusion anyway—something his mind had conjured in his final moments before it went dark.

His body grew warm after he took her hand. It was a gentle heat at first, but it built itself into a searing fire. Hannibal started to thrash; it felt like he was shaking apart. Hannibal tried to compel the girl to stop, but his song came out weak and warped. It devolved into a single, shattering scream, but the girl held on.

Finally, the fire in his blood subsided and the girl's grip slackened. Hannibal snatched his hand back and tried to roll away from his attacker, but got tangled up in his legs. His...legs?

Hannibal stared down at his toes, his human toes, and wiggled them in the sand. She had changed him. He was human. But how? And why?

The strange girl helped him to his unsteady feet and embraced him. For some strange reason Hannibal reached back and not in anger either. He should be livid. This transformation was a step down on the social order by many degrees, but it felt right. All of it felt right. Being human. Holding her. He stroked her hair like a parent might comfort their child. A name floated up from some dark corner of his mind before terror struck. _ ‘Abigail.’  _

Hannibal pushed himself away from Abigail as a flood of memory poured into his mind, but the visions were unrelenting. He stumbled and fell.

“Sorry,” she said, but her apology lacked sincerity. “I almost wish I didn’t have to do this. You were doing so well on your own, but you'll need some of your memories back in order to explain all this to him.”

Hannibal saw himself in his past life, the life he had shared with Abigail. Will was there also, and Hannibal remembered doing terrible things to them both. At the end of the montage, only Will remained—covered in blood and wrapped in Hannibal's arms. He felt content. He felt loved, and then...he felt Will push them both over a cliff. Of all the memories, the last one was the most vivid and the most painful.

When he came around he was on his knees at Abigail’s feet shivering and in distress. 

“Yeah, you were a real jerk, and I want you to remember that. I especially want you to remember how it ended. At his heart, Will will always be a good man. So behave, Hannibal, because there are no third chances.”

Abigail knelt down beside him. “A part of me wants to send a message with you, but it is probably better that there are no goodbyes between Will and I. Neither of you needs my ghost in your lives any longer. You will finally have each other all to yourselves so be kind, be sweet, and for God’s sake, make sure he eats something that is not a carbohydrate. Farewell, Father.” Abigail kissed him on the forehead and the world winked out of existence. 

  



	13. Epilogue

Life sucked.

Life sucked even harder when everyone assumed you were a crazy, cannibalistic killer.

The crewmen that had rescued him had also found his bone collection, and logically decided that Will had killed the crew following the wreck of the _Ariadne_ and eaten them to survive. _Killer Will_ , that’s what the papers called him, which he assumed was some sort of reference to the whale and his own marine biology work. It was so stupid. Orca’s weren’t even his field of study.

To be fair, Will hadn’t helped his case any in the beginning. Burning with fever, he had talked liberally about Hannibal. While this talk of his imaginary mermaid boyfriend had laid the groundwork for his temporary insanity defense, it hadn’t kept him out of the mental hospital.

Two years. It took two years to convince his doctors that was no longer suffering from the lingering effects of PTSD and scurvy, and that had only been possible by burying his memories of Hannibal and renouncing his existence. But try as he might, the memories always returned in his dreams.

Will felt like he was living two different lives since then, and lately, he’d spent more time living in denial than allowing himself to remember. It felt terrible to admit, but he was beginning to prefer it that way. Denial allowed him to feel normal despite everything that was wrong. He was finished as a scientist. Research teams weren’t exactly eager to sign on with a man who had allegedly killed and eaten his last group of associates.

Things weren't all bad though. Will had landed a small teaching job at a community college and been reunited with his dogs. A major publisher signed him to a book deal, which had given him the down-payment for his new house and a much needed change of scenery. Sitting on the edge of an eroding bluff with only one road leading up to it, the house felt defensible and secure. Most importantly, it was close to the sea. These things gave him stability.

Will returned home that night and stripped away his guise of sanity by changing out of his work clothes. He poured himself a tall glass of whiskey, and ordered himself a pizza. He was halfway through his second glass when the doorbell rang.

The dogs rushed the front door yapping at the visitor with mock hostility. Will whistled at them to settle down, but it was not the pizza man who waited outside.

The stranger wore a three piece, plaid suit and stood with his back to the door. When he turned his head to the side, moonlight bounced off his high angular cheekbones and peppered blond hair. Will dropped his glass; it shattered on impact.

The stranger turned around and looked at him with a face that Will knew all too well.

"It’s you," Will whispered before his knees buckled.

The man caught Will and scooped him up into his strong arms as if bearing the weight of another adult man meant nothing to him at all. The dogs leapt forward barking in various degrees of alarm, but they backed off when the stranger hissed at them. It was a savage and animalistic sound—an order from an indisputable apex predator. The dogs yelped and retreated, and just like tha,t a new hierarchy was established within the pack.

Will put his arms around the neck of this alien creature because he didn’t know what else to do and also because it felt right. He allowed himself to be carried bridal style into the living room remembering all those times he had carried Hannibal this way.

Will let his head rest on the stranger’s shoulder. The man smelled like apricots and salt. He smelled like Hannibal; looked liked Hannibal...felt like Hannibal. _‘Will you kiss like Hannibal?’_ Will thought.

The house was quiet except for the whining of Will's dogs and the low growl of the ocean outside. They sat down on sofa and adjusted until Will was comfortably straddling his lap.

“I’m going to be so pissed when I wake up,” Will said in a voice that shook like a spaniel. This had to be dream, a cruel dream.

The stranger smiled. It was a small smile, one intentionally meant to hide his teeth, and Will felt a tear roll off his cheek seeing the familiar expression.

The man leaned in and kissed his wet cheek clean. It was warm, soft, and sweet, but after a three year fast, Will wanted none of this tenderness. He captured the man's bottom lip with his teeth and turned it into a passionate kiss.

The stranger tasted like Hannibal and moved the same rhythm and force. Will rolled his hips experimentally, and the stranger responded exactly like he was supposed to if...if he really was Hannibal.

Will started sobbing in the middle of their kiss. The man drew back and gently brushed the curls away from Will’s eyes. His face was full of worry and alarm.

“How do I know it’s really you?” he said.

The stranger regarded him with Hannibal’s dark eyes and silently mouthed a single syllable word. It was a word Will had watched those lips form a thousand times over. It was a sight he could never forget. _'Will,’_ they said.

Will’s doubt retreated like the tide. “Oh God, Hannibal! It is you! But how?” Ten more questions fired from his lips while Will pawed at Hannibal’s body, his human body.

Hannibal grinned broadly exposing a row of mostly flat, imperfect human teeth. “Will, I have so much to tell you,” Hannibal said in a deep, accented voice.

Will nearly fell off Hannibal’s lap in a state of shock when he registered what had just happened. “Wait. SINCE WHEN DO YOU TALK!?” he shouted.

Hannibal began to laugh. His laugh sounded like waves crashing against a hollow rock. He pulled Will’s ear to his lips and whispered everything that was in his heart. "Will, I love you."

Will nuzzled Hannibal's cheek, and ran his hand through his hair. "Please, say that one more time." 

"As often as you would like, my love. Forever."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well that's a wrap, folks! Thank you all for joining me on this ride and for all your lovely comments. <3 They've meant the world to me. I hope you enjoyed the final chapters.


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